30-year Christian bookstore looking for new owner
Dayspring Christian Bookstore is celebrating 30 years in business under the ownership of Mary Kohler.
Dayspring Christian Bookstore is celebrating 30 years in business. Owner Mary Kohler’s store is on West High Avenue in downtown New Philadelphia.
“We opened Oct. 8, 1988,” Kohler said. “Over those 30 years we’ve seen a lot of changes downtown and many businesses come and go.”
The store features a large selection of books on faith and philosophical topics in a number of genres, movies, gifts for special occasions and a full stock of items used by churches in the area.
The store has its roots in another business, The Gospel Bookstore in Berlin. “I knew the owner of the store there,” Kohler said, “and I saw an article in the Bargain Hunter at that time in which he said he’d like to open another store in New Philadelphia. I thought, ‘I know this guy, and I’d like to do that,’ so I contacted him and said that if he opened one, I’d like to be the manager.”
When such a store opened in 1988, it was called Gospel Bookstore II, and it began across the street from the current location with Kohler at the helm.
The problem was Kohler had never managed a store before, let alone a niche bookstore. She had been a bookkeeper for a trucking firm.
“So I went to work at the Berlin store that July and learned all I could very quickly,” Kohler said. “But you can’t learn it that quickly of course. I’m not kidding when I say this has been 30 years of learning every day. But I started out with a real love of books.”
Kohler’s husband has overseen the bookkeeping and financial end of the business while Kohler has seen to the day-to-day customer service.
The store did very well through the 1990s. Then with the coming of the internet and more customers seeking out their purchases online, business began to sag a bit around 2004.
“That continued for awhile,” Kohler said. “But it picked up quite a bit again in about 2010. It reached a point where it leveled off and became steady.”
The store hosts numerous author book-signing events throughout the year.
Kohler explained Dayspring Christian Bookstore now draws customers from a wide region, especially to the east. “Most of the stores in that direction — toward Pennsylvania and West Virginia — have closed, so we have a lot of customers from that area,” she said.
Having survived what brought about the end of many of her competitors — from small family-owned stores to Borders — Kohler is now looking to relax a bit and enjoy some time with family, and Dayspring is offered for sale.
“It’s doing well, and I don’t want to close the business,” Kohler said. “We would like very much for it to keep going.”
Kohler said anyone who would like to buy and carry on the books and gift store would not find themselves adrift as they learn to keep the venture successful and growing.
“I would certainly hang around and help out unless they didn’t want me to,” Kohler sad with a laugh. “We’ve been very focused on service to the community, and I’d like to see that continue.”
Kohler said she’d have the time to be able to help out and said she has no major plans for retirement. “I’m not planning any big trips or major changes,” she said.
Kohler said she’d just like to relax and concentrate on her health and family.
Dayspring Christian Bookstore is at 143 W. High Ave. in New Philadelphia. The website is www.dayspringchristianbookstore.com. The store also maintains a Facebook page and can be called at 330-343-4881.